Wireless communication terminals have evolved to include increasingly more functionality. For example, some wireless communication terminals are capable of generating, acquiring, storing, processing, displaying and/or playing various kinds of digital data signals. Such digital data signals may include, for example, audio signals such as voice, music or other audio signals, still image signals, and/or video data signals (which may or may not include accompanying digital audio signals). In addition to storing, displaying and/or playing such data signals, users of appropriately configured communication terminals may also desire to share such digital data signals with other users. Thus, system operators have implemented services such as wireless email and MMS to permit users to share digital data stored on a wireless terminal.
In a conventional system for sharing digital data using wireless terminals, a user of a first wireless communication terminal (the “originating user”) stores a digital data signal, such as, for example, a digitized still image. The user may then send the digitized still image to a remote second wireless communication terminal (the “receiving user”), or to a group of remote second wireless communication terminals (for example, wireless communication terminals listed in a distribution list stored in the first wireless communication terminal). The second wireless communication terminal may receive the data signal from the first wireless communication terminal and play and/or display the data signal based on commands from the receiving user. Such systems are commonly referred to as “push-based” systems, because they rely on the first user to “push” the data signal to the remote user based on an assumption by the first user that the second user desires to receive the data signal.
According to other known systems, an originating user may post a digital data signal, such as a digital still image, to a remote database and send a notification signal to a receiving user notifying the receiving user that the digital data signal is available for retrieval from the database. The receiving user may then access the remote database and download the digital data signal. Such a system may be generally referred to as a “post-based” system, since the digital data signal is posted to a remote database and subsequently received by a receiving user.
Conventional systems such as those described above may suffer from a number of drawbacks, however. For example, in push-based systems, the originating user may be required to make an assumption as to the type of information the receiving user wishes to receive, and/or the format of such information. As a practical matter, in a communication system in which users are billed based on the time and/or bandwidth required to transmit a digital message or on a per-message basis, an originating user may be deterred from incurring the expense associated with sending a digital data signal to a remote user absent such a-priori knowledge.
Moreover, post-based systems may require the digital data signal to be stored at a remote location, which may be expensive, particularly for large data signals. In addition, for security purposes, such systems may require an extra layer of management protocols (for example, username and password sign-ons) which may make the process of retrieving stored information signals more time-consuming and inconvenient for the receiving user, thus decreasing the probability that the receiving user will utilize the wireless communication system to retrieve the digital data signal. Accordingly, efficiently utilizing a wireless communication interface to share digital information continues to be a challenge.